


Team Dragon -- A Spellborne Spinoff

by The Firelight Magus (Crystalliced)



Series: Spellborne [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Action/Adventure, Developing Friendships, Developing Romance, Drama, F/F, F/M, Fantasy, Heartwarming, Magic, Ninja Analogues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-18 08:33:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29365551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crystalliced/pseuds/The%20Firelight%20Magus
Summary: It was amazing how significant otherwise insignificant events could be, bolstered by circumstance and human influence. A single conversation could set two children, not so dissimilar from each other, as rivals. Another could turn a gentle girl onto the path of a Lunari, marked by bloodshed and necessary evils.And a single spark, lifted by the flap of a butterfly’s wings, could light an inferno. But even as fire burned, it nurtured, and from the ashes could rise something far greater than what might have been.Sayaka Hoshiko had only a single desire — to prove to herself that even the coldest of nights could be warmed, and that the hottest of flames could be tempered.(An alternative entrance into the world of Spellborne.)
Series: Spellborne [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1682548
Kudos: 5





	1. Spark, I

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Giiagriiarie](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Giiagriiarie).



> For first-time readers, this story is set in the Spellborne universe, which is my primary original fiction. However, it is written in a way that allows those with zero familiarity with Spellborne to understand the work with ease.

#  **Team Dragon, Side A**

#  **Spark, I**

“Do you like ramen?”

“Not in the slightest.”

It was amazing how significant otherwise insignificant events could be, bolstered by circumstance and human influence. A single conversation ensured that two children, not so dissimilar, would set themselves as rivals instead of friends. Had one been less stubborn, or the other less cold, they could have become the other’s first real friend, two particularly lonely children together surrounded by many things that they didn’t really understand. 

But that hadn’t been the case, and despite sitting next to each other in class for an entire semester, the two spoke to each other only when necessary. 

The first child was Sayaka Hoshiko, a petite blue-haired girl with startlingly bright blue eyes and a love for ramen. She was dressed in the standard Academy uniform for women, a white blouse and black skirt covering her frame. A small badge pinned to her chest indicated her year of education with a single glimmering star. Her first conversation with another potential Lunari her age had ended so poorly that it had put her off from trying to make friends outright, and instead she’d focused on something else entirely — one-upping her rival, even if she didn’t think of him in those terms. 

The second child was Yuki, ward of the state of Alune, and nothing more — he didn’t acknowledge any other name. Then again, he didn’t care much for anything at all, an icy demeanor to him utterly unsuited to a newly eight-year old child, so it was perhaps unsurprising that the two of them had gotten off on the wrong foot. He had short, messy black hair and cold blue eyes, and was dressed in the male Academy uniform, a white dress shirt and black slacks with a single-star badge adorning his chest. It was fairly easy for him to blend into the background, and for the most part, he did exactly that. The fact that Sayaka was — mostly out of spite — trying to match and surpass his innate academic talents through sheer hard work was completely lost on him, let alone the reason why, and he simply wrote the girl off as not especially interesting. 

At the South Academy, monthly student rankings were a fundamental part of one’s everyday life, and were based on objective test scores as well as practical examinations. Early students trained primarily in foundational skills such as memorization and physical ability while also learning basic reading, writing, mathematics, and weapon maintenance. 

After all, a Lunari was not much more than a tool of the state, and that oftentimes meant being a trained assassin. For Manaweavers, those born with the ability to manipulate the natural energy in the air to their own advantage, becoming a Lunari was almost always their fate.

That made even something like the student rankings, a supposedly objective measurement, subjective if it meant that a better Lunari could be produced. And, a month into the second semester, an instructor noticed the dynamic between two of their top-performing students, made some discreet inquiries as to the reason behind said dynamic, and presented an idea to some of the other instructors. 

The next month, Sayaka’s ranking slipped above Yuki’s.

The blunette hadn’t said anything to him. Not a single thing. Her smug smile upon seeing the scores had spoken volumes to him. It wouldn’t have bothered him ordinarily, but she simply wouldn’t stop — even three days later, she was still smiling to herself as she sat down at her desk, simultaneously proud of her hard work but mostly satisfied at her triumph over the ramen heretic. 

“Next month,” he’d hissed underneath his breath at her.

Yuki was many things, but he was still a child, and even he wasn’t immune to that level of provocation. 

Sayaka had only smirked back cockily. “We’ll see.” 

The instructors, upon hearing of the interaction, had patted themselves on the back for a job well done before launching investigations into what other things they could do to create artificial competition. 

Several months passed as Sayaka and Yuki competed against each other, skyrocketing their positions from simply ‘close to the top’ to ‘the top’, and abandoning just about everything else in order to do so. Sayaka’s parents were surprised at their child’s sudden studiousness, but brushed it off as it not being a bad thing. Yuki, who had no living parents, had no one to tell him that it was rather strange to dedicate nearly sixteen hours a day to studies. Under normal circumstances, Sayaka wouldn’t have been able to compete with someone who had such an advantage in time and natural intellect, but Yuki wasn’t so absorbed in the race between the two that he was willing to abandon his other responsibilities in order to win. 

The two of them therefore competed almost evenly at just about everything they could. Their rankings wildly fluctuated, helped along behind the scenes in order to keep them motivated. Through it all, they rarely interacted directly, only sparing a few words for each other every month. The instructors watched warily, wondering if one of them would eventually snap under the pressure. A fight would be the worst possible outcome — for one or both top talents to be injured, maybe even severely, would hurt the graduating class’s prospects...

Instead, though, relations between them cooled into a simple rivalry, the intense focus that drove them through the first two years mostly simmering down into a gentle boil. Yuki simply wouldn’t engage with Sayaka, even when she began to act more provocatively to try to get a reaction out of him. 

In response, he developed a sense of dry humor, learning how to frustrate her quickly, and once Sayaka realized that she was getting far more flustered than he was, she gave up on it altogether, bunkering down in an attempt to surpass him once and for all. To her consternation, he responded with utter indifference for all except a single field. 

Manaweaving. Manipulation of the energies in the air. Yuki was exceptionally gifted at it, whereas Sayaka wasn’t. She worked every day to bridge the gap, clawing for every ounce of her control. But even despite that, four years later, she hadn’t managed to bridge the gap. She could beat him in academics, in most weapon usage, in hand-to-hand combat, in stealth, but she couldn’t ever do more than tie against him, no matter how hard she struggled. 

Eventually, they discovered their affinities, the element that they were most suited for, and Sayaka discovered that she had a particular penchant for Wind. When she found out that Yuki had a similar affinity, their Manaweaving competition rapidly developed into a Windweaving competition. 

Lunari children were fed growth stimulators that rapidly accelerated puberty and mental growth, so they were both legally fourteen by the time they entered into their fifth year of education. And a day into their fifth year, Sayaka, under the recommendation of one of the few friends she had made after the first years of intense competition, decided to change things up a bit. 

* * *

The classroom was a plain room with little of interest, simple wooden desks and chairs lined up in neat rows of five, and well-used blackboards covering the front and back walls. The left wall featured a wide, clear window, allowing the morning sun to stream into the room. As students slowly filtered into the classroom in preparation for homeroom to start, a certain blunette seated in the desk in the second row, second to the left, couldn’t help but stare at the entrances, waiting for her target. 

Idly, Sayaka wished that she had the window seat. That way, she wouldn’t need to look into the light in order to face the person to the left of her. It sometimes made it hard to maintain eye contact. That normally wouldn’t matter, but the person who happened to sit to the left of her was— 

A boy walked into the classroom. Her eyes narrowed in triumph. 

“Yuki,” she said as he sat down in the coveted window seat, “you’re not doing anything after the end of classes, are you?” 

The black-haired boy glanced dismissively at her. “Why do you ask?”

“I’m going to change your mind on ramen. Come with me after classes finish. I’ll pay for it.”

He looked contemplative. “I suppose free food isn’t a bad thing. Ramen...those are noodles, right?”

Sayaka stared at him, involuntarily clenching her hands into fists. “Are you...are you trying to tell me that you didn’t know what ramen was?” 

He shrugged. “Why would I?”

“So when I asked you ‘do you like ramen’, and you responded ‘not in the slightest’, it...didn’t occur to you to ask what it was?” the blunette asked, eyebrow twitching. 

“That wasn’t the question,” the boy said matter-of-factly. “You asked whether or not I liked ramen. I did not. Whether or not I knew what ramen was wouldn’t have changed my answer.”

“You...you...!” She let out a wordless sound of frustration. “Whatever! Make yourself available!” 

“Alright," he replied, apparently indifferent as he opened up a notebook. 

Huffing, Sayaka dropped herself into her seat, trying her best to avoid committing murder. It’d look pretty poor on her academic record, after all. 

Of course, the minor dispute between the two hadn’t gone unnoticed by anyone. By now, they were both regarded as the strongest in their class, and their rivalry was common knowledge, so anything they did was of interest. A few students shifted their afternoon plans, too curious for their own good, and the instructors decided to follow the new proceedings carefully.

More obviously, though, the blonde-haired girl to the right of Sayaka waited until Yuki was distracted before flashing a thumbs-up and a smile to the blunette. 

That girl was Kaede Suzuki, matchmaker extraordinaire and a Windweaver just like Yuki and Sayaka. She was Sayaka’s first friend, providing a gentle counterbalance to the girl’s rougher edges, and after observing Sayaka’s dysfunctional relationship with Yuki, had told her in the kindest terms possible that their conflict was really dumb and ‘I’m pretty sure you’re old enough to get along with someone who has conflicting interests, aren’t you?’

Needless to say, Sayaka had left that idea for last. Still, though, she could hardly argue it hadn’t worked — for the first time in over five years of an antagonistic acquaintanceship, they would be meeting for reasons unrelated to the Academy. To her own confusion, she found herself strangely excited about the idea. 

The day slipped by excruciatingly slowly, but soon enough, the pair was walking down the stairs of the multistory building, lost in thought. Sayaka, in particular, was wondering how to approach her rival in conversation. If she didn’t say anything, she knew that they would go through the entire afternoon in nearly complete silence, and that would just be unsatisfying. 

But what was she to do? With a jolt, Sayaka realized that despite knowing him for about five years, she didn’t actually know anything about him at all. Sure, she could recall his last ten test scores off of the top of her head, and knew that he excelled in Windweaving, seals, swordsmanship, and tactical analysis, but she didn’t know what he liked or didn’t like. She didn’t know his birthday or favorite color — though she suspected it was black — nor why he wanted to be a Lunari. 

In summary, despite five years of competition, they were nothing more than acquaintances. And that unsettled her. He’d been her primary motivation for most of her childhood, far more than abstract concepts like loyalty and duty and even finance. 

Five years, and she barely knew anything about him at all. Wasn’t that ridiculous? But she could hardly say ‘hey, want to be friends’, either. No, whatever she did, it would have to be more subtler than that. 

“What do you think friendship is?” slipped out of her mouth without any input from the rest of her brain. 

_Smooth, Sayaka,_ she thought ruefully to herself. 

“Strange question to ask,” Yuki responded, but to her relief, he seemed to be giving her question actual thought. She didn’t interrupt him, the two walking through the gate of the Academy, exiting its stone walls, and walking down well-paved roads towards their destination. As the sun began to slide below the horizon, the street lamps flickered on, bathing the streets with a pale orange light. The symmetrical homes of the Lunari, ugly but functional stone and wooden structures with flat rooftops, made it easy to get lost when all the walls and many of the landmarks looked the same. Sayaka, though, led Yuki with practiced ease. 

“I suppose you could say that a friend is someone who you have a mutual bond of trust and affection with,” he eventually said. 

Sayaka nodded. 

‘Do you dislike me?’, she wanted to ask, but something stopped her from saying it. Apprehension, perhaps? 

“Why?” Yuki asked when it became obvious that Sayaka was too preoccupied to reply. She blinked, surprised that he would bother continuing the conversation, and almost said something to that effect before closing her traitorous mouth and forcing herself to actually think.

“Do you have any friends?” Sayaka asked, intentionally stripping every trace of sarcasm out of her voice. 

“No,” Yuki answered immediately. “Because I do not trust anyone else.”

They walked in silence for a few moments.

“Why not?” 

“Never been given a reason to,” the boy said, shrugging. 

“But—” Sayaka cut herself off, trying to figure out how to word her next sentence. “I haven’t done anything to hurt you, have I?”

He opened his mouth to respond, paused, then reconsidered, eyeing her thoughtfully. “You...that’s right. You haven’t.” 

Competition in the Academy wasn’t always so benign as theirs, and fights broke out once in a while. The instructors would only bother stepping in when necessary, and the guards that patrolled the top of the wall almost never inserted themselves into schoolyard scuffles. Yet, the two of them only physically competed against each other when necessary, and Sayaka had never once even considered trying to take him out of the running in any other way. 

And, Sayaka realized, he hadn’t done anything like that, either. Hell, she was the one trying to provoke a reaction from him more often than not.

“You don’t have to say we’re friends,” Sayaka said quickly. “But I’m not out to get you, you know.”

“Fair enough,” Yuki agreed. “If it makes you feel better, I’m not out to get you either.”

The blunette blinked. “Of course not. You don’t care enough, right?”

He smiled slightly. “Precisely.” 

“But then why bother to compete with me at all?” Sayaka asked, bewildered. 

He shrugged. “I...well, it isn’t unpleasant, having someone to test myself against.”

“Ah.” 

_He’s an orphan, isn’t he,_ Sayaka thought to herself with a sudden burst of realization. _That’s why he introduces himself without a last name. Because he doesn’t have one._

Their surroundings began to shift, the cookie-cutter homes of the Lunari fading away into more civilian housing — though most rooftops were still completely flat as per building regulations. They had moved from the Inner Ring, the section of Alune dedicated to the Lunari and certain important figures, to the Outskirts, the much wider and well-patrolled ring that contained most of the civilians of the state. 

Yuki looked around curiously. “It’s much brighter here, isn’t it? Not in terms of lighting, but...” 

Sayaka nodded. “You haven’t come out into the Outskirts before? The regulations are a good deal less strict for civilians, and a lot of them built their own homes, or paid someone else to do it for them.”

“No, I haven’t. Everything I need is in the Inner Ring, after all.”

Sayaka shook her head, a rueful smile on her face. “It’s more fun here. The food’s much better, for one. You should explore some time.” 

“Why?” Yuki asked, seeming genuinely confused. Sayaka resisted the urge to make a sarcastic comment and eventually just shook her head again, exasperated.

“Anyways, we’re almost here. Look, do you see that red building?”

As they approached, more details came into view — two glass doors barred entry to the building, and the inside had a few wooden tables as well as a larger bar area. Overall, it was a fairly small place. 

“I do,” he said dryly. “I suppose that’s where you’re taking me?”

“You suppose correctly,” Sayaka beamed, opening the door for him. “Ladies first?”

He smiled sardonically. “I suppose you wouldn’t count as a ‘lady’.” 

“Huh? What’s that supposed to mean!?”

* * *

A butterfly flapped its wings, a spark caught where it wouldn’t have before, and from two meaningless events came a far more meaningful outcome — an inferno. 

“Let me pay!”

Yuki held the check away from Sayaka as she reached over the table, intent on snatching it out of his hands. “Fifty-fifty.”

“You agreed on free food!” 

“That’s before I realized it would be this good — thank you, by the way, the meal was excellent,” he addressed their server, the young lady watching them with an indulgent smile on her face. “But it would be disrespectful to the meal that I’ve eaten to not pay for at least my own share.” 

“Finder’s fee!” Sayaka said triumphantly. “I brought you here, so therefore you should let me pay for you.” 

“That is not how that works,” Yuki retorted flatly. “If — _if_ that applied here, then the restaurant would be paying _you_ , not the other way around.” 

“Good try, Sayaka,” the server snickered, eyes twinkling with mirth.

“Shut up, Madoka,” the blunette said, embarrassed. “Seventy-five, twenty-five, final offer.” 

“I don’t think you understand how negotiating works,” Yuki said, the slightest of smirks on his face. “I have the check. I decide how the payment gets split.”

“Is that so? Well, Madoka, you can put it on my tab—” 

“Sorry,” the server said sheepishly, slipping the receipt into Yuki’s outstretched hand. “He already paid. For all of it.”

“What—” Sayaka gaped, lost for words for a moment. “You traitor! How could you choose a few extra coins over the many years I’ve come here?!” 

The boy smirked. “It’s just good business, Sayaka. Maybe you should run one of your own, see what it’s like. After I beat you so badly in the rankings that you’ll retire out of shame, that is.” 

The blunette scowled. “Yeah? Well, I hope you remember who’s been the top overall student for three months in a row!”

In lieu of responding to that, Yuki turned to the amused server, standing up and taking his backpack with him. “I’m sorry for my companion’s uncouth behavior. We’ll be departing the premises now. Please enjoy the rest of your evening!”

“Gah! Don’t just brush me off like that, you jerk!” 

“Thank you! Have fun!” Madoka said, a teasing lilt to her voice. 

“Thanks!” Sayaka called back brightly before trailing after her departing rival, hastily slinging her own bag over her shoulders. “Hey, get back here!” 

* * *

Later in the evening, Yuki stepped out of his shower, slipping into a comfortable black shirt and beige shorts. He’d had a fun time, he supposed, though with so little time dedicated to recreation, he hadn’t had much to compare it to. 

_But I did have fun, all the way up to Sayaka dropping me off at home,_ he thought to himself. _Me, of all people. I didn’t even know I could feel that kind of way anymore. When was the last time I...?_

A knock on the front door interrupted his thoughts. Confused, for he wasn’t expecting any visitors, he made his way over.

“Who’s there?” he called out cautiously.

There was a moment of silence, then the sound of sniffling. “It’s...it’s Sayaka, Yuki, p-please let me in.” 

The boy frowned, opening the door as requested. “Is everything okay? It’s rather late—” 

He trailed off, taking in her appearance. To be frank, she was a mess — her Academy uniform was covered in dirt, rips, soot, and — was that blood? She didn’t seem to be wounded, at least, but she was clearly distressed, eyes red and teary, and— 

“My house burned down,” Sayaka said, voice hoarse. “While...” 

Yuki flinched, realizing what she wasn’t saying.

“Your parents?” he asked, a strange sense of guilt suddenly welling up inside of him. 

She shook her head, and that was all the answer he needed. 

“C-Can I...can I stay here for now?” she asked, voice shaking. “Please. I don’t have...”

_‘I don’t have anywhere else to go’._

“Of course,” he said. “As long as you need to.”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As you can see, we're taking a very different approach to Team Dragon this time compared to its previous iteration. It's a bit more serious, especially at first, but this story is thematically very different than Spellborne, and its main character is certainly far different despite her initial similarities.
> 
> The mana system, despite it being precisely the same as it is in Spellborne canon, will also be approached differently. Sayaka doesn't care as much about the subtleties of the world, and that is reflected in what she's interested in learning. 
> 
> Overall, this should be a different experience to Spellborne, and probably a more 'fun' one, too.


	2. Spark, II

#  **Spark, II**

A little more than a week later, it was almost as if nothing had happened. The funerals were handled with the cold efficiency typical of the Lunari, Sayaka’s salvageable belongings were recovered and the money her parents had saved were transferred to her, and she returned to school, outwardly as cheerful as ever. No one questioned her absence, though rumors spread quickly and quietly. 

Kaede was concerned, but the blunette simply feigned complete ignorance with her, and the blonde matchmaker didn’t have the heart to pressure her. Thankfully for her peace of mind, though, she’d noticed someone else growing closer to her, and so she put her faith in him. 

Sayaka couldn’t explain why she’d put her faith in the boy. Perhaps it had been the conversation they’d shared, or the meal that they’d had. Either way, when she’d wondered who she could go to for help, he’d been the first person to come to mind. And thankfully, she’d had his address — all she had to do was retrace her steps, after all. 

But he’d helped her. The first night, she’d woken up from a nightmare in a terrified panic. She didn’t tell him what she’d seen — though he had a few ideas — but apparently it had been bad enough for her to avoid sleep outright. 

Forty hours later, she’d been approaching a mental breakdown, and Yuki, at a loss, had wrapped her into a hug to help her feel less alone. That had helped to calm her down a little, and she’d fallen asleep less than a minute later. Since then, she’d adamantly refused to sleep without him there, and he hadn’t had the heart to turn her down. It didn’t stop her nightmares, but it made her feel a little bit better, and that was all she could bear to ask of him. 

One week. Sayaka allowed herself to grieve for one week, then she boxed away her emotions as best she could and shoved them deep inside of her. It helped that she hadn’t been especially close to her family, but she had still lived with them, and it had _hurt_ to lose them. Some part of her still blamed herself for not being there, but she ruthlessly reminded herself that she couldn’t have predicted what had happened. It was a freak accident, nothing more and nothing less, and it wasn’t her fault.

Some days, she almost believed it.

There was more than just the guilt and the sadness, though. Whenever she closed her eyes, she could feel the heat of the flickering flames still surrounding her, and the impossibly unique scent of charred flesh involuntarily filled her nose. 

Fire scared her. 

To Sayaka, that was completely and utterly unacceptable. So, one week after the accident, she decided to do something about it. 

“Yuki,” she said as the pair had begun their trek home after classes, “I need your help learning how to wield Fire.” 

He glanced sharply at her. Her request wasn’t a small one — she was already an established Windweaver, a manipulator of Wind mana. Developing a second elemental affinity wasn’t recommended since being good at one element was almost always better than being mediocre at two. 

“I should remind you that my potential for Fire was nearly zero,” he replied. “If you want to learn, then—” 

“But you’re about to awaken your Water element, right?” Sayaka asked insistently. “You’re one of the few people my age who are trying to develop more than one affinity. Whatever you have to say could be really useful.” 

He thought for a moment, the two walking silently with the setting sun behind them. “Why Fire?”

“Because...” she trailed off. “Because I’m scared of it.” 

Yuki blinked. “That does not logically follow.”

She shook her head impatiently. “I need to be able to control it, Yuki. That’s how I can stop being afraid of it.”

He raised an eyebrow. The Lunarian Manaweaving system used by the Lunari was based on a system of harmony — harmonizing the ambient mana to work with the user. Sayaka’s attitude was far more reminiscent of the attitude of their neighbors — the Arcacian Magi, and their usage of wands to wield mana as a tool instead. 

“Careful, Sayaka. You’re starting to sound like a magus,” Yuki said neutrally.

The blunette scowled briefly. “I don’t care. Not if it means I can deal with it. So, Yuki, please. Help me.” 

He considered her for a moment, then shrugged. “I’ll see what I can do. How about we start tomorrow? I need to go to the library and brush up on review if I’ll be remotely useful as a teacher.” 

She nodded, mixed relief and guilt flooding through her. Relief, because she was taking the first step forward to being able to be near an open flame without flinching. Guilt, because once again, she was imposing on him, someone who she wasn’t even particularly close with— 

“Sorry,” she mumbled, the apology bubbling out of her before she could stop it. “You don’t have to. You’re already doing a lot for me, and I’m just...” 

He shrugged indifferently. “It’s fine. It’s what friends are for, right?” 

Sayaka almost tripped on her face. The boy glanced at her quizzically. 

“I-I’m fine,” she said quickly. “If you don’t mind it, then...thanks.” 

He smiled slightly. “No problem.” As if he’d said nothing of consequence at all, he turned away, continuing to walk without a care in the world.

Sayaka stared at his back in disbelief. 

“Friends, huh...?” she whispered to herself. Then a small, shy smile, the first real one since the accident, flitted across her face. “I guess so.” 

“You coming?” Yuki called out, already halfway down the street. 

“Yeah!” Sayaka shouted back, racing towards her friend with a grin on her face. “Wait up!” 

* * *

The next day came with startling speed, and shortly after classes ended, Sayaka found herself sitting attentively in Yuki’s living room as the boy himself sat across from her. They were both still dressed in their school uniforms, not having bothered to change. 

The room was a simple one, a loveseat and a chair facing each other, with a short square wooden table separating them. Sayaka was lounging in the former, leaving Yuki to sit in the latter, but he didn’t seem to mind. 

The walls were mostly stone, though the doorways and hallways were reinforced with solid wood. What was notable about the room, though, was how little decoration there was — a single snowglobe sat on a wooden drawer, and although the occasional bookshelf here and there was filled with a variety of hardback books, there was very little in the way of personal effects. 

“Alright. Let’s start with the basics,” Yuki said, leaning forward. “Awakening, as you should very well know by now, is what?”

Sayaka nodded. “It’s when a Manaweaver completes their affinity shift to a different element completely for the first time.” 

“That’s...acceptable, I suppose. Right now, you and I are both Windweavers. That means our default state is suited for manipulating Wind Mana, or just Wind for short. Awakening is the process of unlocking a different ‘default’ state, right? Essentially, Awakening is the process in which you will enable a ‘default’ state corresponding to Fire, which, in turn, will make you a Fireweaver as well.” 

“Uh-huh. Any reason why we’re going over day one stuff?”

“Silence, you magus heretic,” Yuki said imperiously. “You need to remember your roots if you want new ones to grow.” 

Sayaka groaned audibly. 

“And on a more serious note? Awakening is so fundamental that it’s really important that you understand it,” he said seriously. “In my first Awakening, I almost died, and one of the reasons for that was because I didn’t really understand what I was doing. The Wind I sought to master nearly tore me apart, instead. Do you get it?”

It took her a while, but she finally understood. “You’re saying that I can’t Awaken Fire if I’m afraid of it.”

Yuki nodded. “Not under the Lunarian Manaweaving system. You’ll just get burned.” 

Sayaka bit her lip. “So, what, I just have to invent a different way to Manaweave?” 

The Windweaver facepalmed. “Are you — did you — no, what the hell?! The lesson here is that you can’t just try to control your fear of fire by learning how to wield it! And a magus mentality would be even worse, because you’re not really one with the element!” 

“Then what do I do?!” Sayaka asked sharply, nearly jumping out of her chair. “Yuki, I can’t — I can’t live scared of it anymore! I’m sick of it! I’m sick of being scared of it! That’s why I need to learn how to control it! I don’t care if I have to become a godsdamned magus, or perform some crazy ritual, or — I can’t do it, Yuki. I can’t.” She slumped back into her seat. “Please, Yuki. I need this.”

For a long moment, he regarded her silently. 

“Do you truly need to have dominion over Fire, or just prove to yourself that you have no need to be afraid of it any longer?” he eventually asked. 

“Either. Whichever. I just don’t want to be afraid,” Sayaka said tiredly. “Sorry. That’s not fair to ask of you, but—” 

“I’ll figure something out.” Yuki stood up. “Give me a few days.”

“Huh? Wait, Yuki, that’s not—” 

“No, I can see how important this is to you,” he said slowly. “I’ll try my best. I can’t promise a miracle, but...” 

No matter how much she harassed him, he wouldn’t answer how he was planning on doing that. And when he disappeared one day after class without a word, she grew genuinely concerned for him. And if he hadn’t trudged in later that evening, seeming tired but none the worse for wear, Sayaka might have actually reported him missing. 

“Yuki?” she asked, hiding her unease. “Everything okay?”

He’d smiled back at her, tired triumph on his face. It was then that Sayaka realized that someone had followed him in, a short young woman with warm brown eyes, black hair tied back in a simple ponytail, and a plain white dress.

“Good evening,” the woman said pleasantly, stepping out from behind him. “My name is Hikaru Kozakura, and I’ll be serving as your Fireweaving instructor. I’ve also been told that you might be interested in healing, but you would need to awaken Water first.”

Yuki gave her a pointed look. 

“I, y-yes,” Sayaka stuttered, caught off guard. Then her eyes widened in recognition. “You’re Hikaru Kozakura, as in...?” 

The woman smiled. “Hikaru Kozakura, ninth-star Lunari of Alune. Colloquially, you may also know me as the ‘Goddess of Mercy’, but I have a distaste for the title.”

Sayaka’s jaw dropped. Lunari were rated on a scale from one to nine. The first level was assigned to Academy graduates, the fourth level was approximately average, the seventh level was considered elite, and the ninth level was reserved for extremely influential and powerful Lunari. 

Hikaru Kozakura was a powerful Lunari with an affinity that wasn’t part of the natural four — an Aberrant. Specifically, she was a Regeneration Aberrant, the first of her kind, and her powers allowed her to revolutionize Lunarian medicine. Using her skills, she’d pushed the frontiers of traditional and mana-based healing. That had been how she’d earned her nickname — directly and indirectly, many lives had been saved by her hands. 

And a woman as powerful as that was interested in her—?! 

Hikaru chuckled, and with a start of realization, Sayaka realized that she had said that last bit out loud. “I’ve had a rather enlightening conversation with the young man here, and needless to say, I think you’ll be worth my time. What do you think?”

“Of course,” Sayaka said helplessly. She was hardly going to say anything else, after all.

“Good. Well, I shall be back...let us say tomorrow afternoon after classes?” The woman bowed slightly. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Sayaka Hoshiko.” 

The blunette blinked as she remembered that she hadn’t introduced herself. 

“I...a pleasure to make your acquaintance, ma’am.” 

Hikaru laughed. “Call me Hikaru tomorrow, understood? Now, I’ll be off.” With one last smile, the medic turned around and departed the room, Yuki silently opening the door to let her out. 

For a while, Sayaka stared speechlessly at the closed door before her gaze turned to the boy next to it. 

“Yuki?” 

The boy glanced over to her. “Yes?”

“Please don’t get me wrong. I’m really thankful for everything you do for me.”

“But?”

Sayaka took a deep breath, drawing on every reservoir of her patience. 

“How the FUCK!?” 

Unfortunately for Yuki, it wasn’t a very deep reservoir.

He smirked. “I told you that I’d figure something out.”

“You also said you couldn’t promise a miracle!” she snapped. “What the hell did you do in order to get the attention of someone like her?!” 

“Clinical trials,” he said simply. “She needs willing participants, and I volunteered myself.” 

She narrowed his eyes. “That — there’s no way that was enough!”

He shrugged. “You don’t have to believe me.” 

Sayaka didn’t, but he wasn’t the type of person to give into pressure, and trying to do so would just be a waste of time. 

“I just...thanks. Thank you. Someday I’ll repay you for this.” She paused. “For everything.” 

He shrugged again. “I’ll let you know when I figure something out. In the meantime, though? Just pay me back by taking it seriously.” 

She nodded, clenching her hands into fists. “I will!” 

* * *

True to her word, Hikaru was there a few minutes after they returned home from the next day of classes, and she made them sit together on the loveseat, claiming the chair for herself. 

“What you need to understand about Awakening,” Hikaru said, “is that it is an emotional transformation as much as it is a physical one. It’s the first time you complete a full aspect shift from one element to another, and so the change in your mindset must be appropriately significant. You are of course aware of how one’s natural affinity will play a guiding role in one’s personality — so you two, as natural Windweavers, are going to tend towards being a bit flighty and independent. Sound about right?” 

Sayaka considered herself, and found the description surprisingly accurate. 

“So what you’re saying is that even secondary affinities can shift one’s personality?” Yuki asked, already a step ahead of her.

Hikaru smiled. “A good try, but not quite. It isn’t actually having the affinity that will change you — rather, it’ll be the process of Awakening it. How can you harmonize with Fire if you do not understand it?” 

Hikaru thrust out her hand. With a burst of mana, flame sparked into being, dancing on her open palm. “Fire is passion!” she said strongly, “and if you don’t have drive, you will never be able to wield it! The simple act of wielding Fire means that you have something that sends your blood racing through your veins! Just as the act of awakening Wind means that you are filled with the desire to be free! Just as the act of awakening Water means that you can find serenity in the most chaotic of moments!”

The two children watched, surprised. 

“Do you understand what I mean now?” Hikaru asked, extinguishing the flames in her hand. “If you do not have it, then you must find it. And most assuredly, you will change in the process of discovering it. Do you have anything that drives you so, Sayaka?” 

_Something that drives me? Well, I’m driven by my desire to overcome my fear, but I don’t think that’s what she meant,_ Sayaka thought to herself. _And before the fire, what drove me was—_

The blunette blanched. 

“I can’t think of anything,” Sayaka lied shamelessly. 

Hikaru raised an eyebrow, then subtly glanced at the boy next to her. 

“Well, you’ll need to figure that out,” the medic said. “As for you, Yuki, perhaps you have a passion like that?”

“I don’t,” Yuki said tonelessly.

“You must have something,” Hikaru said, smirking, “in which case, you’ll most likely need to think about that passion and learn to invoke the emotion whenever you want to use Fire.” The brunette glanced pointedly at Sayaka. “Just as Wind brings the sensation of lightness, so too will Fire bring a rush of emotion, and a genuine passion, I’ve found, is one of the easiest emotions to invoke to trigger an aspect shift to Fire. Similarly, a genuine desire for freedom is what I use to trigger a Wind aspect shift.” 

“Huh?” Sayaka blinked. “You need to use an emotional trigger to change your affinity? I’ve never heard of that.” 

“You don’t need to at first,” Hikaru agreed. “But if you want to be able to make a shift in a single moment, like all of the elites can do? You’ll need to be able to call on your feelings at will.” 

“I see,” Yuki said thoughtfully. “Is that also a concept we’ve ‘borrowed’ from the Arcacian Magi?” 

Hikaru smiled slyly. “Someone’s been doing their reading. Yes, it is — just as how the magi have wand movements and incantations, we have aspect shifting. They’re crutches to help us manipulate mana, though the Lunari, of course, train the usage of incantations out at an early age. On the other hand, consider a basic elemental technique where you empower a blade and swing it, projecting out an energy arc. A skilled person could do that without moving their blade at all, but it would be much easier to actually swing the blade, correct?”

“Oh!” Sayaka clapped her hands together. “So even though it’s a crutch, it’s still not necessarily a bad thing, right?”

The medic nodded approvingly. “Exactly. You’ll still need to learn how to aspect shift manually, but from the moment you awaken Fire, I expect you to begin learning how to _properly_ aspect shift. Now, why don’t you two show me how much progress you’ve made on Fire and Water, respectively?”


	3. Spark, III

#  **Spark, III**

Kaede Suzuki considered herself a simple girl. 

She just wanted to make the people around her happy, after all. She wanted to help Sayaka come to peace with her rival. She wanted the lonely Windweaver boy to become a little less lonely. She wanted to honor the memory of her father, and become a Lunari. A defender of the peace. 

And, well, she didn’t want to do what her mother wanted her to do and run the shop. Kaede wanted to make everyone happy, but she had her own dreams too, and what she wanted to be was dependable to everyone, not just her mother, and she couldn’t do that as a shopkeeper. It was selfish, she knew, but she simply didn’t want to. 

She knew that Yuki and Sayaka had considered her a little bit weak. That was okay. She didn’t need to be the strongest like they did, and was content to sit in their shadow. They could be the strong ones. She just wanted to make sure that they knew how to be happy. 

Sometimes, though, she couldn’t help but wonder to herself if maybe she didn’t take things seriously enough. Would she be left behind? Undoubtedly. Sayaka and Yuki both had big dreams, and they couldn’t — wouldn’t — shouldn’t stop for her. 

Still, though, that hadn’t been enough to motivate her. No, it wasn’t until Sayaka disappeared for a week, and rumors began flying around — that had been when Kaede had reconsidered her lackadaisical attitude. Because if Sayaka wasn’t as strong as she seemed, then maybe Kaede needed to be there after all. And if she needed to be there, then she’d need to make sure that she was strong enough to even be considered.

So Kaede stopped playing around. She hunkered down, studying intensely — but studies had never been her strong suit, and she knew that. No, studying wasn’t going to be her specialization. It had to be Windweaving. Sayaka was, strangely enough, shifting over to Fire, and Yuki to Water — leaving her as the only real Windweaver in their section. Despite that, though, she knew she wasn’t the strongest Windweaver there.

Her next course of action, then, was obvious.

“You want me to teach you Windweaving?” Yuki asked, bewildered. The two of them were amongst the rest of their class on the open green fields surrounding the Academy building, practicing their close-combat skills. To prevent any interference, though, they were spread out quite a bit. 

“Yep!” Kaede said, wincing as his open palm slammed into her guard. 

He hopped back, clearly evaluating her. “Why me? You’re closer to Sayaka, aren’t you?”

The blonde girl shook her head. “She’s not really a teacher. To be honest, I think you would do better with it.”

“Why?” He jabbed at her, prompting her to step back. 

Kaede hesitated, then yelped and ducked as he pivoted into a spinning jump kick. She could feel the wind ripple over her head in the wake of the mana-empowered attack — forget trying to block that, it would have broken both her arms with ease. 

“Because of that,” she grunted, rolling into a better position. “You won’t hold back. So I’ll get better quicker.”

For a moment, the two of them traded blows wordlessly, the air filled with the sounds of flesh hitting flesh and the shouts of their peers.

“Are you sure?” Yuki asked as he stepped back, mana gathering around his legs. “You’re right. I won’t hold back. I’ll make you try to quit, even.” 

Kaede leapt out of the path of another scything kick, one that would have surely drawn blood had it landed. “Because I’m too weak?”

“Because you’re too gentle for this hellish life,” he corrected, pausing for a moment before continuing to rush at her. “I don’t believe there is a more kind spirit in this entire Academy than you. It’s not that you can’t, it’s that you shouldn’t.” 

“What makes you say that?” Kaede gasped out between quick strikes, focused solely on keeping him off of her. 

“Are you ready to kill someone?” Yuki asked coolly. 

For a critical moment, the blonde flinched, and in that moment of indecision, the boy lashed out, his hand locking around her throat in an instant. Kaede choked as he lifted her by her throat, her hands instinctively trying to pull his away, ineffectually scrabbling against his mana-reinforced skin. Her feet kicked at his torso, but he ignored the blows, his reinforcement far exceeding her own.

“Killing someone is probably the least you’ll be expected to do,” he said calmly, as if she wasn’t desperately trying to claw his hands off of her. “We can’t always do what’s right, you know? We must do what we’re told to do. So if you were told to torture someone, could you? If you were told to let an innocent civilian die, would you?” 

Kaede only vaguely heard his words as her vision began going black. 

“You don’t have the necessary—” 

Desperately, the blonde surged mana into her fingers and lashed out — not at the hand holding her by the throat, though.

“—attitude to — agh!” 

In an instant, she was released, collapsing to the ground gracelessly as her abused windpipe drew in air. She coughed violently, gasping in pain as her throat protested. When the convulsions subsided, she gingerly touched her neck — and was surprised to feel a dampness on her fingers. She pulled back—

_ Blood? _ she thought blearily, then looked up.

Yuki was clutching his right eye, blood dripping down beneath his fingers. Kaede’s heart dropped. 

“Y-Yuki,” she gasped out, then immediately regretted talking as her throat throbbed in pain. 

He pulled away his hand to reveal three slashes, starting from his right temple. The middle one, and the longest, stretched to just above his eye, and the lowest one stopped right next to it.

_ I...I tried to gouge out his eyes, _ Kaede realized, horrified as his gaze focused on her. 

Instead of condemnation, though, he smiled slightly. 

“So you have something in there after all. I take back my objection,” he said. “I will teach you what I know.” 

* * *

True to his word, Yuki began fulfilling his promise to Kaede. In truth, he hadn’t known much more than her, but he had been able to direct her progress and offer her helpful tips he’d found along the way. As someone rapidly switching to Waterweaving, though, he hadn’t been able to be quite as helpful as he’d wanted to be, but she’d seemed happy with what he’d given her.

And, he reflected with a bit of irritation as he dressed himself in casual, light clothing, she was still apologizing for nearly taking his eye out. It hadn’t even scarred. What was the problem? She did what she needed to do, so why would he be mad about it? He’d all but forced her to, at that. No, he wasn’t mad at her for trying to hurt him — he was far more annoyed that she kept trying to apologize for it. 

With a shake of his head, he pushed those emotions away as he continued getting ready for the day. It was vital that he remained calm — the Awakening Ceremony today demanded it. 

Right. Today was the day he would be awakening Water. The day he would take the plunge, so to speak. Hikaru had spoken of Awakening as an emotional transformation, and Yuki knew that she would be right. The day he had unlocked Wind, he had experienced a temporary but intoxicating freedom from all of his fears and doubts. And every time he called on it, he could feel a pale shadow of those feelings. Awakening Wind had shown him that there was something else out there, something more than fear and self-doubt, and even though that moment had long since faded, it wasn’t something he could ever forget. 

As he prepared breakfast, he wondered what Water would be to him. Most textbooks had described the moment of transition as a second of perfect clarity, whereupon his Wind had been a second of perfect freedom. Though, as he’d been falling to his death at that time, he hadn’t had that much time to appreciate it. 

But he remembered. It wasn’t something one could forget. 

He knew also from his Wind Awakening that the ritual was unique to every person. After all, Manaweaving wasn’t much more than harmonizing one’s self with the ambient mana, learning how to draw it within one’s self, and utilizing it to produce a desired effect. A deep, personal connection was naturally required in order to do that. 

Yuki hoped that he wouldn’t need to be dropped from the upper atmosphere in order to find that connection this time. 

Given his special circumstances, though, he was sure that he wouldn’t struggle. In fact, he was even bringing something — or rather someone — that he was sure would be conducive to the success of the ritual. 

“I’ve never seen you look so spaced out,” Sayaka said tentatively, picking at her food from across the dinner table. “You okay? Worried?”

He snorted. “Hardly. I’m completely confident in the success of the ritual, all the more so since I doubt I’ll need to risk death for it. My natural affinity with Water outstrips my Wind.”

“Huh? Then why did you awaken Wind first?”

“It’s all my teacher at the time could teach,” Yuki said, shrugging. “Anyways, enough of that. Finish up quickly, and let’s head out.”

Sayaka had been rather confused when he’d first made his request to her. After all, it was beyond unusual to perform an Awakening in the presence of another — the interference caused by the mana Manaweavers leaked out of their skin could cause serious problems. 

Yuki had, upon her objection, dismissed it as unimportant and had refused to explain why. Despite his rejection though, he knew that she was still curious. How?

“So why’re you making me come again?” Sayaka asked from behind him, dressed in her Academy uniform. That particular request had confused her, too, but she’d gone along with it anyways. 

“Like I told you last time, I’ll explain after the ritual, when I actually know the answer.” 

“Fine,” she said, huffing. “Can you at least tell me where we’re going, then?”

“The waterfall.” 

Sayaka thought for a moment, visualizing a map in her head. 

“Those!? That isn’t even a proper waterfall! That’s really where you think you’ll have the best connection with Water?” 

Yuki shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never awoken Water before,” he said dryly. “I just have a good feeling for it, that’s all. If it turns out I was wasting your time, then you can go and I’ll pay for your next ramen.” 

“Alright,” Sayaka said, suddenly much less reluctant. “Lead the way, captain.”

He sent her an amused look that told her he knew exactly what the source beyond her sudden complacency was, but didn’t comment as they walked through the streets. The uniform housing of the Lunari melted away to reveal the more decorated houses of the Outskirts, and shortly after, the pair pulled up to the waterfall in question.

As Sayaka had noted, it was hardly a proper waterfall — rather, it happened to be where a river fell off a cliff, crashing into a basin before continuing downhill. It was perhaps five meters tall at best, the water running off into a natural stone pool and spewing mist into the air. The top of the waterfalls were lush with grass and large, flat stones, making it a popular picnic destination. 

Yuki’s heart raced a little.

“This is good,” he breathed, feeling his mana prickle in his veins. “Sayaka, sit at the top of the falls.”

She made a face. “My skirt’s going to get dirty, but fine.” She split off from him, climbing up the hill to the top of the waterfall as Yuki drifted closer to the basin of water, letting the sound of the falling water sink into his being. The mist rose to greet him, settling against his skin and dampening his clothes. 

“This is going to be easy, isn’t it?” he whispered, words dampened by the pouring water. “I’m far closer with Water than I am Wind. After all...”

His next breath joined the curtain of mist. 

“It’s just a different state of matter, isn’t it?” Yuki said softly, eyes glimmering an icy blue. 

Yuki was an Iceweaver — a rare variant of Manaweaver born with innate abilities. Those people were called Aberrants — and closely monitored, for their innate abilities often made them unstable. In Yuki’s case, a lapse in control would cause him to become an unfeeling berserker, interested only in his own survival. 

This same risk led Alune and most of Lunaria to adapt a policy — that is, execution-on-sight. As such, Yuki was forced to hide his Ice Aberration, awakening his Wind Affinity ahead of schedule in order to help disguise his real self. 

He stepped back from the waterfall, looking up to see Sayaka, legs swinging over the side of the cliff. When she noticed him staring at her, she waved mockingly. He smiled at her briefly — then, without another thought, took a deep breath and closed his eyes before hurling himself forward into the basin of water.

Thusly prepared, he began his Awakening. Just like a typical Manaweave, it had four major steps. 

First, what was known as the Breathing — accessing the ambient mana in the air. This was intensely important in an Awakening, even if it was less important in standard Manaweaving. Yuki spread out his sixth sense, sensing the mana around him. Unsurprisingly, the nearby area was saturated with Water. He drew it to himself, then into himself, assimilating the mana with years’ worth of practice. Soon enough, the ‘colors’ of the mana had been washed away and replaced with his own. 

Secondly, accessing his Root. The Root was the mental construct within him that allowed him to feel and pool his mana together in preparation to use it. For him, it was centered right over his heart. He felt it now, closing his eyes and concentrating deeply on it. His mana responded, shifting in his body, racing through his veins and setting his nerves alight, and soon he could feel the mana pool in his Root. His extremities grew a bit cold, drained of most of his mana, but he didn’t pay any attention to it. 

The third step was the Flow, the movement of mana through his body. Whereas the last step involved pulling mana to the root, this one regarded pushing it out, suffusing it with intent before allowing it to fill one’s body. 

So, surrounded by his element, Yuki thought to himself even as his body began the complex, indescribable process of shifting his mana from Ice to Water. 

Officially, Awakening was the process in which one slowly developed the skill and the affinity necessary to utilize techniques from a certain element. One couldn’t use a Fire Manaweave without being a Fire Manaweaver — and to be a Fire Manaweaver, one needed to have Awakened Fire. Awakening was therefore supposed to be the point at which one transformed one hundred percent of their mana from whatever default state it was to Fire.

Yuki knew that was complete and utter bullshit. An Awakening could be forced. There was no reason that an Awakening couldn’t be done on any element instantly save for the fact that it was much more dangerous. Yuki’s teacher had imparted that knowledge quite thoroughly on him — the boy could hardly forget being dropped from the upper reaches of the sky to his death, after all. So despite having skipped much of the ‘official’ process, Yuki didn’t even have the faintest bit of fear. He simply knew it would work. 

Hikaru had said that an Awakening was an emotional transformation of sorts, allowing one to become truly close with their element. That rang far more true to Yuki. After all, it was an indisputable law of Manaweaving that one’s affinities helped influence a person, and that their primary affinity, in particular, influenced one all the more so. This rule was all the more true for Aberrants — it was why he was so naturally cold and indifferent, even as a child. It was just the way he was.

But yet— 

But yet Sayaka, with her stubborn, bullheaded competitiveness, had broken a crack in the ice. Had been so singularly annoying that he had been forced to take notice. He’d noticed her and responded in ways that he ordinarily would not have. A proper Ice Aberrant wouldn’t have cared, wouldn’t have noticed, and wouldn’t have bothered. But Yuki, coming off of his own personal tragedies and still young, hadn’t been a proper Ice Aberrant then, and Sayaka had chipped his armor while it had still been developing. 

That was okay. Ice was solid, rigid, inflexible — and what Yuki wanted in his life now was anything but. Yuki might have been of Ice, but Water was not so far removed from that — certainly less distant than Wind. And what Yuki needed now wasn’t bitter, sharpened Ice, but the quenching coolness of Water.

‘To find serenity in chaos’. 

Without Sayaka, Yuki would have had to change in a different way, to focus on another anxiety. He would have needed to accept his inescapable death in the face of a state that wanted very much to kill him. 

But he wasn’t alone anymore. He had someone he could protect. And that simple, calm desire melted the coldness in him enough for something else to take root. Water spread through his body, filling his nerves and pouring into his heart. 

The fourth and final step was the Spark, the combination of one’s skill and intent to create something real, something tangible. 

Yuki’s faith molded together with his intent as the last bits of mana within him converted, and for a single moment, he understood. He understood how far he’d go for Sayaka, the girl who had broken the ice around his heart. He understood that he’d so freely do so because of how little value he had assigned to his own life — because he was an Ice Aberrant, marked for death. If he wanted to make that life useful, then he’d need to be useful quickly, before he was found out or, worse, lost control. He'd used himself as a bartering tool to Hikaru Kozakura with that exact mentality. 

But he knew now that his life did have value now, even if it hadn't before. Because he was the Water to Sayaka’s Fire, and that without him, she would burn away into a million tiny pieces. Because that was the nature of Fire. 

But that same Fire had melted the worst pieces of his nature. It wasn’t inherently bad. It just needed to be kept in check. 

_ I will be her balance _ , Yuki thought, and then he flooded his mana into the water surrounding him.

* * *

Sayaka leaned cautiously over the waterfall cliff and peered down at the basin of water, squinting to try to pick out details from the mist. It had only been a bit longer than a minute, but she couldn’t help but worry about her friend. She’d almost intervened when he’d thrown himself into the water, but she’d assumed that was part of his Awakening. 

She was a little less certain now. All she was sure of was that he was still under the water, and he hadn’t come up yet. 

_ One more minute, _ she thought nervously.  _ One more minute, and I’m going in there, whether it interrupts the ritual or not— _

A splash from the river next to her caught her attention. Sayaka quickly shifted back and turned to look, raising an arm to shield her eyes as mist fell onto her skin.

“Wha—?” she started to say, confused, then yelped as a hand clasped around her ankle. She reflexively pulled away, stumbling onto her rear, but the hand — wet, she realized — held tight. 

“Yuki, what the hell—” she gasped, staring at the soaked boy. He’d apparently managed to scale the waterfall somehow, and— 

“Hey, Sayaka,” he grinned. “Care for a swim?”

Sayaka’s eyes widened in fear as she resumed frantically squirming away. “You wouldn’t.” 

Yuki grinned, then pulled. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And thus ends the first arc of Team Dragon. 
> 
> Next up, a familiar face from Spellborne enters the fray!


	4. Ardent, I

#  **Team Dragon, Side A**

#  **Ardent I**

Two months went by in a flash. Sayaka continued trying to puzzle out Fire under Hikaru’s guidance, and Yuki began taking the first steps on his journey as a Waterweaver. Because they were all but beginners again, they destroyed their class rankings, which only encouraged them to work harder, the rivalry between them still as strong as ever. 

The seats were shuffled. Luckily for Yuki, they were seated in the same place. Unluckily for Sayaka, well, they were seated in the exact same place. The only thing that changed for them was that Kaede now sat directly behind Yuki, and there was an empty seat next to Sayaka. 

It was then, as their lives settled into a comfortable rhythm, that it was interrupted by an unexpected transfer student. Transfer students were incredibly rare at their age — after all, being a Lunari wasn’t something just anyone could do, and talent for Manaweaving was often identified at a younger age. And, naturally, being a trained Manaweaver opened up many options in life. Even if one didn’t want to become a Lunari, the first five years of schooling were all but necessary to get a proper tutor in order to train one’s gifts. 

To top it all off, there could only be seventy-five students in the sixth-year class that Sayaka and Kaede were in. For someone to transfer in, someone would have to get kicked out, a process that was troublesome for everyone. A transfer in the late years, therefore, was a very strange occurrence. As a result, everyone was interested in the new student, and more than a few were a bit resentful. Sayaka wasn’t aware of this, but Yuki was, and he resolved silently to watch the situation. 

As luck would so have it, the student was transferred into their class. They turned out to be a petite girl with short, neat black-hair and a thin, lithe body. 

“Pleased to meet you, everyone,” she said softly. “My name is Setsuna Tsuri.” 

Sayaka cocked her head thoughtfully. For some reason, her quiet, unassuming demeanor reminded her of someone. But who...?

She paused, then glanced to her left. 

“What?” Yuki mouthed at her. 

She turned away without answering, hiding a small smile. He wasn’t like her anymore, at least. But back before they’d become friends? His cold, lonely demeanor? That much she sensed in the transfer student. She may have looked shy to a more inexperienced eye, but by now Sayaka had nearly five years of experience reading quiet people, and she knew that Setsuna was not just shy but outright indifferent. There were nerves there, certainly, but underneath it was something a little bit more.

The blunette narrowed her eyes suspiciously. Under different circumstances she might have tried to ruffle the girl’s feathers a bit to see if she could pull out what was hiding, but she had a feeling that Yuki wouldn’t appreciate that kind of behavior from her. In lieu of that, there was little she could but observe. 

That resolve was tested when the transfer student in question took her seat — right next to Sayaka. 

“Nice to meet you,” Sayaka whispered to the girl. “I’m Sayaka Hoshiko, Fireweaver. If you need any help, please feel free to ask for it.” 

Setsuna glanced at her. “I will...keep that under consideration.” 

_A bit cold,_ Sayaka thought to herself. _She didn’t even return my greeting. Well, not my problem, I suppose._

She turned back to Yuki, quietly engaging him in conversation and completely missing the way the quiet girl eyed her thoughtfully. 

That would have been all to their relationship — Sayaka turned off by Setsuna’s cold impression, and the latter girl completely indifferent — if it wasn’t for the events of a few days later. 

Yuki and Sayaka only heard about it from Kaede — apparently, she’d gotten into a fight with a few people. Something about her not being an actual Manaweaver had rubbed a few people the wrong way, considering that she had unintentionally forced someone to be cut from the class. As a result, they had taken it upon themselves to ‘teach her a lesson’.

Those same people were now in the hospital and not expected to come out anytime soon. A Manaweaver she might not be, but helpless? The rumors of the devastated third floor corridors pocketed by explosions had proven her anything but, and combined with what they had learned, Yuki and Sayaka were able to identify her speciality — sealing. 

Sealing was a complex art, to say the least. It involved an incredible level of precision and study, was fundamentally limited by design, and took a lot of work in order to use on the battlefield. Masters of the art were rare and revered, since sealing tech was one of the main drivers of quality of life in Alune. The lights used for both homes and streets were based on a sealing design, as was the water and sewer system.

It was still, though, something that was supposed to take quite a bit of time to utilize in combat, let alone when ambushed and outnumbered. 

Setsuna defied all those expectations, and the uncertainty that generated made people scared of her. It certainly concerned Sayaka enough to convince her not to try growing any closer to the enigmatic sealer.

So, naturally, the person she wanted to stay farthest away from her was the one that decided to approach her. 

* * *

Getting away from Sayaka was fairly simple. All Yuki had to do was ask Kaede to distract her at the end of classes. He felt a bit bad about taking advantage of Kaede’s perceived debt to him, but was nonetheless completely willing to leverage it anyways.

Cornering Setsuna, though, had been a challenge that had required nearly a week of careful observation. The girl had a ridiculously uncanny sense for when she was being followed, and it only took her a single day to begin varying up her schedule, sharply curbing Yuki’s options. 

About all he was able to figure out from his observations was that she didn’t seem to have any real friends or acquaintances, the few people who had talked to her prior scared off by her reputation and aloof nature. 

His frequent disappearances didn’t escape Sayaka’s notice, though he was able to obscure just what he was up to. Kaede was willing to help him with that, too, to his relief — Sayaka didn’t and couldn’t suspect the gentle, innocent girl of lying, and so she provided him with perfect alibis. 

But all things eventually came to an end, and his observation was stopped by the girl in question. At the end of yet another day of classes, he’d followed her as she’d made her way to the rooftop, apparently oblivious to his presence, and he’d followed her, suspicious of her sudden change in competency.

In hindsight, he should have realized that it was a trap. That was made clear to him from the moment he climbed up the stairwell and opened the door to the rooftop to find her facing him, a hard look in her grey eyes. 

“Why are you following me?” she said coolly. “Lie to me and I detonate the explosive seal you’re standing on.” 

He smiled slightly. “Ironic. The least of the Manaweavers is the greatest Lunari of all of us. What fools everyone has been. And as for why? I wanted to speak to you, of course, but I didn’t think you’d feel comfortable with me approaching you considering the events of the last week.”

Her eyes widened slightly before narrowing. “And so you thought that stalking me would be the best way to make me feel ‘comfortable’ with you?” 

“Of course not,” Yuki said bluntly. “But putting you in a position of power over me? I think that was about the only way to arrange this so quickly.” 

Setsuna stared at him for a moment. “You’re not scared of me?”

“Why would I be?”

“The rumors. And don’t tell me you aren’t aware of them. Your friend is friends with that chatty blonde girl.” 

He shrugged. “I would only need to be scared of someone willing to defend themselves if I was wishing to do harm to them.” 

She blinked, stunned.

“I know a little something about loneliness,” he said softly. “It changes you. You become unhappy, bitter. Unable to trust others. I was like that, once.” 

“You? You spend all of your time with that girl. Sayaka, wasn’t it?”

He nodded. “It hasn’t always been that way.” 

“You don’t have family?”

“They’re dead,” he said simply. 

“Ah. My condolences,” she murmured, looking mildly uncomfortable.

He shrugged. “I just wanted to tell you that, I suppose. You don’t have to be alone, not if you don’t want to be.” 

“I...see,” she whispered, her voice suddenly fragile. 

He smiled slightly. “That’s all.” He gestured at his feet. “Am I free to go, or will this thing blow up on me if I move?”

“Ah...” She blushed slightly. “There isn’t anything there. It was just...”

“A bluff, huh?” Yuki smiled at her. “You really are an excellent Lunari, aren’t you? I look forward to seeing just what you can do...perhaps in the upcoming interclass exercise?” 

The sealer nodded, the slightest of smiles on her face. “Thank you.” 

With that, Yuki left the rooftop, leaving a very thoughtful and rather confused girl behind. 

Sayaka, hearing about the conversation secondhand from him later, wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. She eventually settled with both, much to his confusion. 

* * *

“Today,” Yuki announced grandly, “we have a transfer student to the class.” 

Kaede, dressed in her Academy uniform and sitting on the living room sofa, was understandably confused. “I...what? You’re teaching someone else Windweaving, too?”

“Well, of a sort,” he agreed. “They can’t learn Windweaving, but the other day they expressed some interest in sitting in on a lesson when they found out I was teaching you. You don’t have a problem with it, right?”

“Of course not,” Kaede said instinctively before her brain even processed the question properly. 

“Great,” Yuki said brightly. “Setsuna, you can come in.” 

The blonde started, surprised, as the sealer in question walked into the living room, also dressed in her Academy uniform. “H-Huh? Setsuna, you—?” 

“I’m interested in what Yuki thinks about Windweaving,” she said shortly, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. 

“Just what Yuki thinks?” Kaede responded immediately, instincts honed by years of acquaintance with Sayaka, then flinched, mortified. “Uh, wait, I didn’t mean it like that—” 

“Yes,” Setsuna said bluntly, unfazed. “He’s a real Lunari.” 

“I think differently,” Yuki agreed, unusually diplomatically. “And as such, Setsuna will be sitting in for...well, however long she feels like, really. You’re the only one stuck here. Well, Setsuna, make yourself comfo—”

Setsuna lifted her hand from the floor and backed away, a simple wooden chair materializing from it a moment later in a flash of blue mana. Without another word, she promptly sat in it, another burst of blue mana bringing a notebook and pencil to her hand. 

Kaede immediately felt a little silly for not taking her own notes. In her defense, though, she paid very close attention. 

“Well,” Yuki said, settling into the remaining chair, “today I’m going to go over non-conventional uses of Windweaving. As you should know, Wind is really good at two things — cutting, and pushing. But just like how seals can get a lot of mileage out of nothing more than sealing and unsealing, you can do more than that. Some examples, Kaede?” 

“W-Well,” the blonde said after a moment of thought, “pulling things is a subset of pushing. When you combine those two with a great deal of control and power, you’re able to possess a limited form of flight, which in turn can offer air superiority. You can...uh, divert projectiles, enhance your own, and turn obstacles on the battlefield to your own advantage.”

“That’s a good start,” Yuki agreed, “but all of those are combat-oriented.” He looked at Setsuna. “Would you like to weigh in here?”

“A Windweaver with sufficient finesse can trace scents to track a target,” Setsuna said without hesitation. “They can eavesdrop from a far range, distort the sound around them, and use the wind to carry them quickly. Windweavers make for excellent sailors, as well. With enough power, Windweavers can suffocate someone or blow their eyes out in the space of a single second, and the best of them can manipulate the weather directly.” 

Yuki nodded as Kaede stared with wide eyes. “That’s good, Setsuna,” he said, smiling slightly. “Wind is a very, very versatile element, and one of the most useful ones both in and out of combat. Understand, Kaede? You’ll need to learn as many uses of Wind as you can, and when you’ve mastered them all, come up with some yourself. Everyone expects the basic toolkit of a Windweaver, but you have much room to innovate. And that will most likely save your life.” 

“What about Water?” Setsuna questioned intently. 

“Water is...” Yuki thought for a moment, “a bit of a special case. It is another extremely versatile element, just like Wind, but shines the most when there are other sources of water for it to draw off of. Of course, at the higher levels, those weaknesses cease to matter, and higher level manipulation becomes possible, such as blood and weather manipulation. For the latter, though, a severe difference in power or physical contact is required.” 

“Oh, but can’t Waterweavers heal others?” Kaede asked. 

Yuki nodded. “Exactly. Every primary element specializes in a specific form of the internal arts, and water’s specialty is healing. Fire is empowerment. Earth, reinforcement. Wind, enhancement. Although basic mana reinforcement is something that every Manaweaver can do, only a Waterweaver can use their mana to easily heal.”

“Why?” Setsuna asked.

“Hm...” Yuki looked contemplative. “That begins to delve into the more theoretical and spiritual subfields of Manaweaving, which I’m a bit less experienced with. Still...” He nodded to himself. “Let’s go back to the four elements. Your affinities influence your personality, right? So there are certain personality traits associated with being a certain type of Manaweaver. What you might not know is that the mana types themselves vary depending on the element, in a way exactly like how you might expect. Fire is hard to control and dangerous for others to touch, Wind is impossible to constrain, and Earth is slow and hard to finely manipulate.”

“Oh, but Water is different?” Kaede said, understanding. 

“Exactly,” Yuki agreed. “It’s the most gentle and precise of all of the elements. That isn’t to say that you can’t make the other elements precise, but of all of them, it is the one most suited for it. Perhaps you could learn how to be a healer without being a Waterweaver, but the process would be so long that it would probably not be worth it.”

Setsuna nodded thoughtfully. “And the dispositions of Manaweavers of the other various elements oftentimes do not support that level of patience and precision, anyways.”

Yuki smiled. “Precisely. You are surprisingly knowledgeable about Manaweaving considering your chosen specialty, Setsuna.” 

She shrugged. “I need to understand how Manaweavers work in order to beat them.”

Kaede tried very hard to not think about the darker ramifications of Setsuna’s statement. 

‘I’m interested in what Yuki thinks about Manaweaving’, she’d said. 

“Well, that’s the theoretical part of the class over,” Yuki said. “Setsuna, you’re welcome to stay for this too, but I’m afraid most of the remaining hour will be dedicated to watching Kaede attempt variations on basic Windweaving, and that’s probably less interesting for you.” 

“I do have other things I need to do,” Setsuna said apologetically. “But this was an informative lesson, and if I’m free whenever you hold your next one, then I’d like to be a part of it.” 

Yuki glanced at Kaede, the girl nodding. “Certainly. I’ll let you know when — they’re usually about once a week, but the times frequently vary.” 

Setsuna nodded. “Thank you.”

“No problem.”

The girl left without another word, leaving the two alone. 

“How interesting,” Yuki murmured to himself. 

“She’s...a bit different,” Kaede agreed nervously.

“Oh, absolutely,” he agreed, “but it’s refreshing. I think she may be even more blunt than me.” 

_More blunt than you? Maybe after you got close with Sayaka,_ Kaede thought but tactfully decided not to say. “A little intimidating, though,” she said instead.

Yuki glanced at her. “Intense, perhaps. But intimidating?” He smiled. “I think she just wants a friend.”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A new student, and now Spellborne readers have an idea of how 1.2.2 could have ended differently.


	5. Ardent, II

#  **Ardent II**

Yuki did not sleep at traditional times. Bolstered by his Aberration, he could go days without rest if he so chose with little negative effects, though he usually preferred to have at least two hours of sleep. Sayaka’s insistence on using him as a teddy bear at first had forced him to adapt to longer sleeping hours, but as her nightmares faded, she’d pushed him out of his bedroom, embarrassed, and he returned to his typical sleep schedule.

It was because of this that he was awake to hear the knock on his door at four in the morning. Frowning, he readied his mana before going over to the door. 

“Who is it?”

“Setsuna.”

He blinked, then opened the door. The girl in question was standing nervously outside, dressed in a white wool sweater and long black pants. 

“You said...that I didn’t have to be alone, right? If I chose?” she asked without any prompting. 

“I...yes. Why?”

“What would...” Setsuna averted her gaze. “What would that entail?” 

Yuki hummed thoughtfully. “Well, I suppose we’d eventually become friends.”

“Friends?” 

Yuki nodded, the faintest of smiles on his face. “Two people who share a mutual bond of trust and affection with each other. At least, that’s how I think of it.”

The small sealer stared at him for a moment. Yuki noticed then that her eyes were a bit bloodshot.

_ Crying recently _ , he guessed.  _ And at this time of night? The most obvious explanation would be... _

“I think I’d like that,” Setsuna said quietly. 

Yuki nodded, then stepped back. “If you have no other plans for tonight, would you like to come in, then? I can make you tea.” 

She hesitated, then nodded, shuffling in past him awkwardly as he closed the door behind her. “I don’t need anything to drink, but thank you for the offer.”

He smiled slightly. “Fair enough. In that case, feel free to sit down in the living room. Please try to avoid making too much noise — Sayaka is sleeping, and I don’t want to wake her up.”

“Okay.” Setsuna did as he said, apparently unwilling to question why the two students were living together. He sat in the chair opposite from her. “Now what?” 

“Now?” He leaned back. “Well, there’s no real procedure for us to follow. What do you want to do, Setsuna?” 

She fidgeted slightly. “I don’t know. I’ve never had a friend.” 

Yuki felt a small pang of sympathy for the sealer. 

“Let’s see...normally, Sayaka and I spend our free time talking to each other.” 

“About what?” 

He frowned. “I...guess there isn’t really any one thing. She usually leads the conversation with whatever happens to be on her mind, and that girl has a wild imagination. I’ve,” he smiled, “never had cause to wonder about which of our instructors might win in a death match, but she has a mental ranking of the entire faculty.” 

Setsuna blinked, startled. “What?”

He snorted. “That was my reaction, too, but it was actually surprisingly intricate. She even spent a day reviewing their public records after I disagreed with some of her rankings to help prove her point. Ah, point is, that was just one of the conversations we’ve had. We’ve talked about lots of different things, much of it not remotely useful.”

The sealer looked thoughtful. “Then why talk about it at all?”

“Oh, that? That’s easy.” Yuki’s expression softened. “Because it’s fun. What about you, Setsuna? Is there anything in your life that you do for fun?”

“Seals,” she answered promptly, flushing slightly. 

He considered her expression, and nodded. “What about it? I’m, well, the best in the class at them, but I suspect that you are much more skilled than I am.” 

For the first time since he’d known her, the petite girl smiled properly, confidently. “Much.” 

Yuki returned her smile. “Mind if I test that, then? Just out of curiosity, of course.”

“Of course,” Setsuna said brightly. “Want to do a simple race? You know the basic dummy seal, right?”

He nodded. “I could reproduce it now, yeah. And I have a few spare engraving tablets. You want to race to see who can complete and power it first, right?”

Setsuna nodded, the confident smile still on her lips. 

“Alright, give me a moment, and I’ll bring them here.” 

Soon enough, the two were sitting across from each other, a competitive smile on Yuki’s face and a carefree one on Setsuna’s. Both of them held special metal engraving rods, the tips sharpened to a square point. In their other hands, they held the tablets, special stone rectangles that were good mediums for seal carving. 

Perhaps the greatest difference was in the way they held the rods. Yuki’s grip was tight, ready to go, but Setsuna was idly spinning it around in her fingers, apparently completely unconcerned. 

“Ready?” Yuki asked. She nodded, still spinning the rod.

_ Well, if she’s going to underestimate me that much, I’ll show her, _ Yuki thought grimly.  _ I may not be a sealing specialist, but I’m not that bad. These rods are no good for precision work either, which is probably something she’s more accustomed to! It’ll take a very quick and steady hand to use these rods without making a mistake, and that’s something I have in spades!  _

“Then go!”

Without hesitation, Yuki brought his rod to the stone, a quick infusion of his mana filling the metal and allowing it to sink easily into the stone. Without hesitation, he started carving the intricate lines of the dummy seal, being careful not to make a single mistake. 

“Not bad,” Setsuna critiqued as she set the rod down in front of her. 

“Given up already?” Yuki asked conversationally, continuing to focus on his work. 

“Oh, no,” she said happily. “I’m just...observing. You’re quite fast at this after all. I can certainly believe that you’re the best in the class.” She paused. “Or, well, were.” 

Yuki smiled slightly, pleased at his progress — nearly halfway done. “You think you can carve this in half the time I have?”

Unbeknownst to him, her eyes glittered with amusement. “Carve? You didn’t say carve. We’re just seeing who finishes first, right?”

“Well, yes, though just to be clear, interfering with the other person’s work overtly isn’t allowed.” 

“Of course not,” Setsuna agreed. 

“Then how are you going to do this without carving—” Yuki cut off as a thought occurred to him. “No. There’s no way.” 

The sealer smiled brightly, blue mana gathering around the palm of her free hand as she raised it over the tablet in her other hand. “Way.” 

And then she brought it down. Less than a second later, she lifted it up to reveal the intricate lines of the dummy seal, carved directly into the stone with an extremely precise manipulation of her mana. The skill was known as printing, and was a hallmark of both an exceptionally precise Manaweaver and an exceptionally skilled sealer.

And Setsuna had done it in less than a second. Yuki dropped his carving rod, dumbfounded. 

“Okay,” he said slowly, “I’ll admit that I didn’t see that coming.”

She smiled. “What I do, I do very well. I have to, considering my...weakness.”

Yuki nodded thoughtfully. “So you can’t Manaweave?”

Setsuna shook her head. “Technically, I could...but I’ve been told that the process of Awakening would almost certainly kill me. My ability to draw in ambient mana, shift it, and store it isn’t much higher than zero. I can use mana, but I can’t naturally gather it.” 

He nodded thoughtfully, then frowned, gesturing at the tablet. “Then, how...?”

Setsuna paused, staring at him for a moment, then reached for the collar of her sweater and pulled it down.

“W-What are you—” Yuki began, surprised, but stopped when enough of her collarbone was revealed to show the faded pink of old scars carved into her skin. 

“Seals can only do two things,” she said softly as she fixed her collar. “Absorb and release. If you’re dedicated and skilled enough, you can use your body as the medium. Then, you are the one absorbing the mana. It isn’t much, just a tiny trickle of mana, but it’s enough to print with.” She gestured at her body. “After I unlocked the barest minimum, I practiced and studied for years, and then I ‘printed’ much more intricate seals inside my body — underneath my skin. Now, I’m a pseudo-Manaweaver, maybe. But it won’t be enough to Awaken an element any time soon.” 

Yuki nodded thoughtfully, staring at the determined sealer in a new light. “Thank you. For trusting me with that knowledge.” 

She shrugged. “You said...that friends shared a mutual bond of trust. So if I want to be your friend, then I need to trust you.” She flushed a little. “We’ll...see about the affection.” 

He smiled. “Indeed. Incidentally, Setsuna, I have a request for you.”

“Yes?”

“Could you teach me how to use seals properly?”

Setsuna’s eyes widened fractionally. “You want to learn from me?” 

“Of course,” Yuki agreed. “You very obviously know what you’re doing...and I think I’d like to learn from the greatest Lunari I’ve ever known.”

She blushed. 

“I...okay. If you teach me more about Manaweaving.”

“Deal.” 

* * *

Dressed in a plain white nightdress, Sayaka stumbled into the living room, blinking the sleep out of her eyes.

Then she blinked again, taking in the sight before her. “Yuki?”

“Yes, Sayaka?”

“Why is Setsuna in our living room?”

Yuki shrugged. “We’re becoming friends.” 

“Is that so?” Sayaka said skeptically, looking between the two of them. “And this had to happen at...six in the morning?”

“Yep,” he said firmly. “We don’t have school today, after all.” 

Sayaka considered this for a moment, then turned to Setsuna. “I wish you the best of luck, and you have my condolences.”

“Hey!”

The sealer cracked a smile. “Thank you. But,” she turned to Yuki, “I need to go now. Do you...think I could come over again?”

Yuki nodded. “Whenever you want. Would you like me to walk you home?” 

Setsuna’s smile turned sly as she stood up. “No need. I live right next door.” 

“...What?”

“You’re the worst tracker I’ve ever seen,” Setsuna said airily as she walked away. “Might want to work on that some.” 

Yuki narrowed his eyes. “It’s not my fault that you’re — that you’re so good at concealing your aurae. You make it impossible for me to track your mana.”

“Get better,” Setsuna teased, letting herself out. “I’ll see you in class tomorrow, Yuki, Sayaka.” 

“See you later,” the two chorused. Setsuna smiled once last time, then closed the door. 

“She seems happier than she was before, doesn’t she?” he asked. 

Sayaka rolled her eyes. “I’m not surprised. She doesn’t seem like the type to have many friends, and here you are, swooping in to save her.” 

His smile widened. “Why, Sayaka, are you jealous?” 

She valiantly suppressed a small blush. “No. Shut up. I was...actually, I was thinking that you’re a lot happier too recently, it seems. Especially since you awakened Water.”

He nodded slowly. “I have become a little less...cold, haven’t I?”

She got the distinct feeling that she’d missed some kind of private joke.

“Well, it’s your fault.” His eyes danced with mirth. “Even someone like me can melt when faced with your particular warmth.”

Sayaka began losing her battle against her blush. “W-What are you saying?”

“You’re the reason I’m happier,” Yuki said simply, smiling warmly at her. 

Scarlet crept across her face. “I, well, of course you are! You’re lucky to have me, and—” 

“I am,” Yuki agreed, that same warm smile on his face.

“I...you—” 

* * *

“And then I ran away,” Sayaka said, flustered.

Kaede gave her a pitying look. “You really need to learn how to handle your feelings better.”

“There are no feelings to handle!”

“That’s exactly what I mean.” 

The two girls were sitting across from each other at Sayaka’s favorite ramen shop, Sayaka moodily staring at her ramen as Kaede wrapped her noodles around a pair of chopsticks. 

“Look, Sayaka, we’ve been friends for a few years, right?” Kaede asked rhetorically. “You trust me, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Then trust me when I say that if denial was a sea, you’d be scraping the ocean floor.” 

Sayaka levelled a flat look at her. Kaede ignored it, serenely popping noodles into her mouth. 

“It’s just a stupid crush,” Sayaka rationalized excellently. “I’ll get over it quickly. I mean, how could I not like him after everything he’s done for me? And all the time we’ve spent together?”

Kaede nodded sagely.  _ The beef broth is excellent, _ she thought to herself _. _

“Really, anyone’d fall for him in my place. He’s a genuinely nice guy, after all, if kind of awkward at times, but even that’s sort of cute in a weird way. And, I mean, watching him warm up has been really nice, and our conversations are surprisingly good, and...”

_ And the meat! It falls apart in my mouth, easily a highlight. And the portions are quite generous, too. All in all, definitely worth it, _ Kaede thought, allowing Sayaka to ramble on in the background.  _ I’ll have to come back here more often. _

“—now Setsuna’s a potential threat, but it’s such an awkward situation that I don’t know how to approach it. I mean, I don’t want to hurt anyone, right? But maybe she’s more his type. Quiet people like quiet people, right? Or maybe—” 

_ Hm, but do I want the beef again? Variety is the spice of life, after all. Maybe a different flavor would be better? Ah, but I better watch my diet. Can’t come here too often. Then, would trying something new be better or worse? I do like this beef ramen. _

“—he hasn’t expressed even the faintest interest in any girl I’ve ever seen. Well, at least a romantic interest. Or, you know, anything at all. Does he even consider me a girl? I walk around in a nightdress and I’ve never caught his eyes straying once. Uh, not that I’d blame him, but the point is—” 

_ If I were to try something new, I might not like it as much, and I’d regret buying it. But if I did like it more, then I’d be more likely to come often, and regret it more when I couldn’t. Either way, it’s a loss. Not trying at all might be easier if I will regret it no matter what I do.  _

“—I guess in the end I don’t know what I should do. It’s...well, honestly, would we even fit together? I feel like he’s already gotten everything he needs from me. Like, he’s happier now, right? Warmer. Definitely a better sense of humor now, and that’s all me, I’ll have you know, but if I considered d-dating him, would he actually become a better person? Maybe Setsuna—” 

_ But not trying at all does seem a little sad, doesn’t it? If I’ll regret it no matter what I do, then shouldn’t I just do what makes me happy at the time? What’s the harm, anyways? All I hurt is myself. Ah, but that’s the problem here, isn’t it? _

“You’re afraid of hurting him,” Kaede interrupted. 

“I...I mean, of course,” Sayaka stammered. “After everything he’s done for me, I have to pay him back somehow, right?”

“Has he asked?”

“Huh? No, of course not—” 

“Then you don’t.” Kaede shrugged. “He doesn’t expect it. He doesn’t need it. He’s done everything for you for the sake of making you happier. Do you know what you should do when someone does something nice for you like that?”

“What?”

“You thank them, of course, and make sure that gift doesn’t go to waste.” The blonde raised a finger. “If you want to repay that perceived debt, you can, but remember that he’s doing all this to make you happy. If you drive yourself to unhappiness, isn’t that spitting on what he’s trying to do?”

Sayaka flinched. 

“Right now, Sayaka, you’re trying too hard. He’s happy. You’re happy, when you let yourself be. So don’t go crazy trying to change that. Isn’t that exactly what you want?”

“I...I guess?” the blunette said uncertainly. 

“As for your feelings, well, who knows how a relationship between you two would go? Maybe you find out that it doesn’t work out after all. Maybe you find out that it does. But after everything he’s done, I don’t see him intentionally hurting you, and he doesn’t strike me as a petty or vengeful type of person. I think the worst thing that’ll happen if you two find out that you don’t get along after all will be a few weeks of hurt feelings.”

“But—”

“But nothing,” Kaede said firmly. “You’re going to be sad no matter what happens. If you hold back your feelings, you’ll hurt yourself. If you confess and he shuts you down, then you’ll be hurt. If you date and things don’t work out, you’ll be hurt. But I think you guys could work out, and even if it only lasts for a little while, I’m sure you two will make some good memories together. Maybe,” Kaede winked, “he’ll be your first kiss?” 

Sayaka flushed. “I...maybe...I guess you might be right.” 

“Of course I am,” Kaede agreed. “Look, if you decide you don’t want to try, that’s fine. But don’t give up for a silly reason like thinking you’re not good enough for him. I know you know better than that, and if you’re not convinced, just think about the way Yuki’s changed recently. By his own admission, you have to take credit for that.” The blonde stood up, placing a few coins on the table. “I’ll leave you to your thoughts. Give yourself some credit, alright?”

“Alright,” Sayaka said morosely, picking at her ramen. 

“Good. I’ll see you in class tomorrow,” the blonde replied, waving as she walked away. 

_ Sayaka is usually so confident in herself that her moments of self-doubt are always jarring _ , she thought to herself with a frown.  _ I hope that she’s able to shake it off...and, maybe, find some happiness along the way. _


	6. Ardent, III

#  **Ardent, III**

“You’re making excellent progress,” Hikaru said, smiling. 

Sayaka grinned, letting her mana settle down. “Thank you.” 

The two were sitting down in Yuki’s living room, sitting on opposite sides of the table.

“But...” Hikaru trailed off, “it isn’t enough. At the rate you’re going, it’ll take you another four or five months for a safe Awakening. That will put you unacceptably behind the rest of your peers, considering that they’ve now had over a year to get used to their primary affinities.”

Sayaka grimaced. “How do I speed it up? Yuki’s was much faster, wasn’t it? Only about three months total, or something like that.”

“Yuki’s,” Hikaru said dryly, “was a very special case. And he ran it by me first. Don’t use him as an example. If you want to minimize the risk of crippling or killing yourself, you will take your time.”

“But I can’t wait that long,” Sayaka said, frustrated.

Hikaru smirked. “I was hoping you’d say that. If you want to dramatically hasten your progress, then you have to revisit that emotional trigger.”

The fledgling Fireweaver winced, recalling her conversation with Kaede not so long ago. 

“You can be honest with me,” Hikaru said simply. “It’s Yuki, isn’t it?” 

Sayaka flushed. “How did you know?”

The medic snorted. “Blatantly obvious. At least to me, anyways. He’s almost certainly not noticed.”

“You’re sure?” the blunette asked meekly.

“Well, he’s noticed,” Hikaru amended, “but he won’t know how to interpret what he’s seeing. Almost certainly thinks that you’re just lonely.” 

Sayaka bit her lip. The loss of her parents still bothered her sometimes, though the wound was far less fresh than it had been even two months ago. She was able to ignore it simply by not thinking about it, but it was impossible to avoid forever.

And if Yuki brought it up out of some misguided desire to help, well, she really didn’t want to go through the painful, awkward process of convincing him that she was fine. Really. She was fine. She was...fine. 

“Sayaka,” Hikaru said softly, “do you want to talk?” 

“No,” she replied immediately. 

The medic observed her thoughtfully for a few seconds. “Would you like to know something interesting about me, Sayaka?”

Confused by the apparent non-sequitur, she agreed before she could even properly process the question.

“I used to be completely and utterly terrified of water,” Hikaru said slowly. “It might not surprise you to know that psychological torture used to be one of the foolproof ways to get around my regeneration. As a result, some...people who wished me harm waterboarded me in an attempt to traumatize me.” 

Sayaka blanched. “That’s...that’s horrible.”

Hikaru shrugged, mouth set into a thin line. “I got them back. But the damage had been done. I had to go to...rather extreme measures in order to ‘overcome’ that fear, and even now I have a distaste for it.” She smiled slightly. “I think that my blood is composed of more tea than water, at this point.” 

Sayaka nodded slowly. “Why tell me about this?” 

“Because I suspect that the thing holding you back from pursuing Yuki is as fundamental as that,” Hikaru said calmly. “Am I wrong?”

Sayaka thought about the Fire she was trying to master. She thought about the boy who had committed himself to walking every step of the way with her. She thought about the way she had burdened him, all but forcing him to take care of her. 

Of course it was fundamental not to want to hurt the person you lik— cared about. What was so wrong about that?

“No,” Sayaka said dutifully. 

“Unless you can think of a desire stronger than your desire to make him happy,” Hikaru said seriously, “you’ll need to address that problem. So, can you?”

Of course she could! Yuki was just a silly crush! There were lots of things, weren’t there? Yes, of course, she wanted to be a Fireweaver. The best one ever, even! 

“Can you name something so important to you that you would give him up?”

Of course! Easily! It wouldn’t even be a moment of thought! No, Sayaka would have no problems giving him up. But who cared about that? She just needed to recall one of the many things she’d give up her feelings for him for. Like her Fireweaving! Yes, Sayaka really wanted to triumph over her fears. It was easy to imagine. She’d be the strongest Fireweaver in Alune — no, Lunaria — no, the world, in all of history!

...She’d do that all alone.

Well, surely that...that couldn’t be so hard...yes, no, not at all. Not a bit of...yeah, she could...she could do that. Right? Yeah, if it was to become the strongest, to triumph over her fears, she could...

She could...

She...

“I thought so,” Hikaru said softly, and with a start, Sayaka realized that she was crying, tears sliding down her cheeks. “It isn’t shameful to care for someone, Sayaka.”

“I know,” she whispered quietly. “I know. I just don’t want to hurt him. He’s done so much for me. I can’t...”

With a soft sigh, the medic stood up, making her way around the table to sit on the couch next to the blunette, gently pulling her into a hug.

“I believe, Sayaka, that you are underestimating that boy quite a bit.”

“H-Huh?” 

“Yuki is not made of glass,” Hikaru said dryly, pulling away to look Sayaka in the eyes. “Should you date and things go poorly, he will survive. In fact, I’m certain that he’ll be far more concerned about you than about himself. That is just the way he is. But I think you knew that already, didn’t you?”

Sayaka didn’t respond.

“You’re scared of being hurt. And that’s understandable.” Hikaru patted her head. “I won’t tell you what to do. But you shouldn’t lie to yourself.” The brunette paused thoughtfully. “And in this case, yours is far more receptive than mine ever was.” 

Sayaka’s eyes widened. “You’re interested in someone, Hikaru?”

“Have been for years,” she agreed. “But he’s not interested in anyone like that, so there’s not much hope. Still, I am...content, I suppose. He indulges me once in a while, too, so it isn’t all bad.” She smiled sadly, resting a hand over her heart. “Even someone like me can’t control my feelings — not easily, at least.”

“So I shouldn’t try to either?” Sayaka asked, understanding her point.

Hikaru shrugged. “You shouldn’t waste an opportunity when it comes. How about you ask Yuki for advice? Might be a good way to gauge his own feelings.”

The blunette flushed scarlet. “What? I can’t ask him for—” 

“Pretend it isn’t him, obviously,” Hikaru said. “Though I don’t know if your acting skills are up to par. Perhaps not, in that case—” 

Sayaka leapt off of the couch, wiping her tears away with her arm. “I can too! And I’ll prove it to you!” 

Hikaru snorted. “I suppose we shall see, won’t we?” 

Without another word, Sayaka stormed off to find the boy in question, completely missing Hikaru’s satisfied smirk behind her. 

* * *

As it turned out, Yuki was lying on the ground in the midst of Training Ground Five, his face buried into the short grass. The cause? A small sealer straddling his back, twisting his arm nearly to the point of dislocation. 

“I will admit,” Yuki said, his voice muffled, “you have gotten substantially better since the first time we sparred together.” 

“Thank you,” Setsuna said primly. “But I haven’t heard your surrender yet.” 

“Well, I— ow, ow, ow, okay, I give,” he yelped as the girl methodically began twisting his arm. At his surrender, she let go and got off, letting him roll onto his back as he stretched his arm. “You don’t hold back do you?”

“No,” she answered promptly. “I don’t have the room to hold back against anyone unless I’m confident that I can get away with it.” 

“And when are you confident about that?” he asked dryly.

“Almost never.” 

“Fair enough,” he agreed. “Still, you have gotten quite good. Another round?”

Setsuna stiffened, looking to the left. “We could, but I believe that Sayaka is looking for you.”

Yuki glanced around at his surroundings. Training Ground Seven was little more than a park surrounded by trees, so there wasn’t much to see. “Really? How can you tell?”

“She’s in my sensing range.” The sealer closed her eyes. “Hm. Perhaps two hundred meters northwest.” 

Yuki blinked. “I’m — you can sense that far? That’s insane! Through the trees, I couldn’t sense even a tenth that distance!” 

Setsuna smiled slightly. “What I can do, I can do very well. She seems to be moving quite fast. Would you like to intercept her?”

“Hmm, I don’t know,” he said, standing up and stretching. “It’s probably about something troublesome. Might be better to sit here and hide her out.” 

“You’re smiling,” Setsuna observed calmly. “You want to go after her, don’t you?”

Yuki’s smile widened. “Of course.” He paused. “I really am tempted to mess around with her, but I’ve already been slammed against the ground once too many times today. Let’s avoid a repeat performance.” 

“You are a bit of a pushover,” she agreed, smiling slightly. 

Yuki smiled slightly, acknowledging her jab, but didn’t respond as he began running out of the training ground, Setsuna not far behind. Moments later, they nearly ran into the blunette in question as she landed in front of the gated entrance to the grounds. 

“Yuki,” Sayaka said, then glanced to the side of him, “and Setsuna. Um, do you mind if I talk to him privately?”

The sealer nodded. “I needed to leave, so it’s good timing. See you later, Yuki.” And without another word, she took off, running off before leaping onto a rooftop and out of sight.

_ No, she didn’t, _ Yuki thought idly to herself,  _ she was perfectly ready for another round. What a considerate girl. _

“What did you want to talk about?” he asked, then glanced around. “And where?”

“How about at home?” Sayaka offered.

Yuki stared openly. The blunette was shifting nervously, eyes glancing from side to side. He rarely saw her that flustered, save for a few moments like her running away the other day when he’d teased her too much. He’d apologized after, of course, and she’d accepted his apology, but he’d had the feeling that she would prefer if he never brought it up again. 

Clearly, what Sayaka needed was a joke.

“You haven’t gotten pregnant, have you?” he tried.

Sayaka didn’t answer, staring at him blankly for a moment.

“...This is the part where you usually say no,” he said, suddenly concerned.

“Of course not, idiot!” she yelled. “Why would you — do I look like — and even if I did, it would be none of your business — and wait is that really what you—” 

_ That’s more like it, _ Yuki thought, satisfied. 

“Have you gotten someone else pregnant?” he asked, suppressing a smile.

She glared. “You aren’t as funny as you think you are.” 

He grinned. “Race you home.” And without another word, he took off, leaping onto a nearby rooftop before continuing his run out. 

“What the — cheater!” 

* * *

A hard run later, Yuki was home, a mildly peeved Sayaka behind him as he stretched out on the couch.

“So? What’s up?”

_ And there she goes _ , he sighed internally as she immediately got nervous again, fidgeting with the hem of her dress. She wasn’t even sitting down, such was her state. 

“Have you ever liked someone?” she eventually said.

He blinked. “Pardon?”

“You heard me,” she said, flushing. 

Yuki considered the girl in front of him. She wasn’t asking for romantic advice, was she? He was probably the worst person for that — but then again, she did trust him, or at least he liked to think so. He was certainly undeniably the closest person to her, but he knew that she knew he wasn’t exactly experienced in these kinds of matters. So then, if she was asking for advice, then who for? There weren’t exactly many options— 

_ No, _ he thought to himself,  _ there was another person she was close to!  _

But he hadn’t thought she swung that way. Shows what he knew, he supposed.

“Yes,” he eventually said. After all, it was true — he liked plenty of people. He liked Sayaka, he liked Setsuna, he liked Kaede, and he liked Hikaru. That was four people, which was more than just one ‘someone’. 

Sayaka reared back. “Really?! Who?!” 

Yuki decided not to fix her misunderstanding. “People. Anyways, why do you ask? Are you asking because you’ve found yourself romantically interested in someone?” 

The fledgling Fireweaver blushed an alarming shade of red. “I...w-well, I guess.”

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I didn’t take you for the type. Good on you, I suppose. Of course, I don’t know if she’ll return your affections, but it’s certainly not impossible. I haven’t seen her attracted to any man, at least...” 

Sayaka blinked. “What?”

“Kaede. She’s the one you’re interested in, isn’t it?” 

“I...what?”

“Maybe I’m being too hasty with that assumption,” he mused. “I suppose it could be someone you know less than that, but you really don’t talk to many other people. Where would you have even met someone else?”

And it was precisely at that moment that Sayaka realized the trap that Hikaru had led her into. But it was too late for her. All she could watch was the inevitable— 

_ Fuck that, _ she thought to herself.  __

“It’s Kaede,” she said, a bit too quickly. 

“Really?” 

“Yes.” Sayaka tried to look as truthful as possible. “I...um, wanted your advice. Because I don’t, uh, really know what to do when I like someone.”

He shrugged. “Well, first you confess to them, and if they reciprocate, then—” 

“I know all that!” the blunette said hastily, shuddering at the thought of Yuki giving her the Talk. “I meant how would I even...” she trailed off, an idea coming to her. With a grin, she finally took a seat across from him, confidence flooding into her. 

“Hey, Yuki, what do you think love is?” 

He blinked, surprised, then smiled. “I suppose you could say that love is a more intense variant of the bond of friendship, typically though not always directed at a single person with whom one shares a special relationship with. Why?”

Sayaka smiled coyly. “Is there someone you love, Yuki?”

He snorted. “Somehow, I knew you were coming back to that. The answer is yes, incidentally.”

A bead of sweat dripped down the back of her neck. 

_ What did he know? Did he suspect that — no, he couldn’t possibly, right? But then...I need to find out what he thinks, _ Sayaka thought frantically to herself. 

“Really? Who?” Sayaka asked innocently.

Yuki smirked. “A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell.”

She snorted, surprised. “Where’d you read that one from?”

The boy shrugged. “Hikaru. Did you know she reads romance in her spare time? What a hobby, right?”

_ Not that surprising, all things considered about her life,  _ she thought but carefully didn’t say. “I’m surprised you’re interested in romance enough to remember that,” she probed. “You never struck me as the type.”

Yuki’s smile turned amused, her internalized panic slowly increasing. “Perhaps not. Romance novels have never been of particular interest to me.”

“But romance has?” 

Yuki shrugged. “Why does it matter?”

“Because I want to know about your love life,” Sayaka said, a little too honestly. 

Yuki pounced. “Why?”

She realized her misstep. “Because it’s...it’s interesting, of course! If you have someone special in your life, then I want to know. After all, we’re — we’re friends, aren’t we?”

“We are,” Yuki agreed. “Though I think we’re a bit more than that, aren’t we?”

Sayaka valiantly tried to suppress her blush. “We...we are?” 

He looked surprised. “Are we not? I like to think we’re a bit closer now than simple friends.” 

Her heart hammered in her chest. Was he — was he?! 

“W-What are we then?” she asked, palms suddenly slick with sweat.

“Why,” Yuki said grandly, “I think that we can call each other ‘best friends’ by now, can’t we?” 

“Oh. Right. Yeah.”

“What’s wrong? You look disappointed,” he said innocently.

Sayaka exhaled, the tension in her body leaving her all at once. “I’m, uh, glad that you think of me that way. You’re...” she smiled weakly, “my best friend too.”

“You sure?” he asked, eyebrows raised. “I promise I won’t be mad if Kaede’s your best friend. I get it, you know. We’ve—”

“You are!” the blunette said, flustered. “You — argh! There, I said it, okay? You’re my best friend! Happy?” 

Yuki rose from his seat, smiling as he crossed the distance between them. Sayaka stared nervously as he approached, unsure of what to expect. 

She certainly didn’t expect him to gently wrap his arms around her, pulling her into a hug — the first time he’d initiated a hug since that first awful night. 

“It does make me happy to hear that,” he whispered, his head on her shoulder and the faint smell of mint in her nose. Her traitorous heart skipped a beat. “And despite how much I might tease you, I do care about you very much.”

Sayaka hugged him back silently, closing her eyes and immersing herself in the feeling of his comfortable presence next to her. 

_ I think everyone was wrong, _ she thought to herself.  _ I don’t think I want romance after all. I just want this. _

And maybe, Sayaka knew, that might change. Maybe she’d want more later, or maybe she’d fall out of her crush entirely. But it didn’t have to happen now. She had time to decide.

And that, she decided, was more important than any romance that she could ever want. The freedom to do as she pleased with the one — the people — she loved. To be happy with them. That was all she wanted.

Deep within her, a spark flickered to life. 

  
  



End file.
